Month: March 2014

David Brainerd House (1879)

The property at 1542 Main Street in Glastonbury was once the site of the 1718 Welles Homestead. As related by Henry T. Welles in his Autobiography and Reminiscences, Volume 1 (1899):

The house and out-buildings with about forty acres of land were sold by my respected friend and agent, Hon. Thaddeus Welles, to Henry Talcott, who being unable to make payment, relinquished his claim to the property. It was then sold to Gustavus Kellogg, and by him to David Brainerd, who having previously removed the other buildings and replaced them with a new barn and tobacco and other sheds, in 1878-9 tore down the house, graded the site, and erected a good modern house thereon.

That Gothic Revival house, which was later owned by Frank Potter, still exists today.

22 Lyme Street, Old Lyme (1843)

At 22 Lyme Street in Old Lyme is a former church building that is now a private home, with the old choir loft converted into children’s bedrooms and a half bathroom where the confessional had once stood. The church was built in 1843 for Old Lyme’s Baptist community, which had previously gathered intermittently at various locations, often private homes. The Baptist Society disbanded in 1923 due to declining membership. Episcopalians purchased the building three years later. In 1934, the church was leased by the Roman Catholic Diocese, which dedicated it as Christ the King Church in 1937. The Parish now has a new church building, completed in 2005, at 1 McCurdy Road in Old Lyme.

Old Lyme Inn (1856)

The Old Lyme Inn is located in an old farm house built around 1856 by the Champlain family. Around the turn of the century, members of the Old Lyme artist’s colony would come to the Champlain farm to paint and used the barn as a studio. Jacqueline Kennedy reportedly took lessons at the riding academy located at the farm. Construction of the Connecticut Turnpike led the Champlain family to sell the house, which became the Barbizon Oak Inn, named for the Barbizon school of painting and a 300-year-old Oak tree on the property. A fire in 1965 led to the closing of the inn, which by then had become the Elegante Restaurant, but the building was restored by later owners to open as the Old Lyme Inn (85 Lyme Street in Old Lyme).